A Better Solution
by IceTaloned Frayfu
Summary: Ed vowed that one way or another this would be the last goose chase Mustang sent him on. Roy did not know how serious he was until he got back. One-shot


**Yo, so this randomly popped into my head one day when I was reading One Piece and it kept bugging me until I wrote it all down. It's just a cheery little scenario that I thought would be hilarious**

**Disclamer: As I am neither the author nor filthily rich I do not own Fullmetal Alchemist or One Piece.**

Roy Mustang was having a nice, normal quiet day. Better than normal, superb actually. Havoc had finished his report early, the coffee machine was actually working, Risa hadn't threatened to shoot him yet, but that wasn't what make it a good day. No it was the fact that Fullmetal was currently on a mission far, far away.

The little brat, yeah he wasn't afraid to called him little (when he was miles away from hearing distance,) had been the bane of his existence ever scene. . . well actually he'd always been a pain.

It had started with some strange reports around the east side of Admistris, some reports about a group of teens who found a trans-dimensional portal in the woods, which was super-secret military code for someone spiked the punch at the local-dance-a-thon. But the town would not be satisfied unless someone with a shiny silver pocket watch and a flashy title told them that everyone would be fine.

Ed graciously volunteered himself when he was caught putting bacon grease in Mustang's alchemy gloves.

He complained of course, the usual I'm-too-busy-researching-obscure-forms-of-alchemy-to-be-parading-around-the-country-on- a-wild-goose-chase, to which Mustang replied that everyone else already had a job at the moment and he was too busy doing making sure the paperwork got done to go there himself. At that point Risa spoke up and asked Mustang if that meant he was actually going to get some paperwork done. Mustang had replied that that was the task everyone else was busy with.

Shortly afterwards Havoc had to call headquarters to explain that the gunshots heard in the office were NOT from an assassin, and no, they did not need backup it was just Roy being lazy and yes, yes, it won't happen again.

That was three weeks ago. Now Mustang was at his desk, looking over the form to order new uniforms for the year and contemplating what would happen if he 'accidently' changed the color from navy blue to lime green (office jobs can be really, really boring) when he looked up. He could hear a familiar sound outside the doorway, clank- thump-clank thump, footsteps made by alternating metal and flesh feet. It seemed that the brat was back. The footfalls slowed, then stopped.

Then the doors slammed open.

"FULLMETAL!" Mustang gasped as he stared at the young alchemist who was standing in the doorway.

Edward looked terrible. His hair was disheveled; his red cloak ragged and torn. Gone were the crisp white gloves and the long black sleeves, replaced with coils of red stained bandages wrapped around his arms. Shadows pooled under his eyes and he looked unusually pale. Mustang was about to shout at him, to demand an explanation when he was stopped short. It was his eyes, his deep golden eyes were swimming with more. . . happiness than Roy had ever seen.

The golden Alchemist walked forward, raised his hand, and without breaking eye contact slammed his silver pocket watch on Mustangs desk hard enough to leave an indent.

"I quit." He said. "I'm gonna be a pirate."

Mustang opened his mouth, closed it. Opened it again and managed to stammer out an articulate "WHAT!?"

"I said that I'm going to be a pirate, so I quit," responded Fullmetal with an evil grin, "Are you alright Colonel? You look a little pale."

Mustang was blinking, open mouthed before he seemed to find his voice. "Ha ha ha you almost had me there. Now what the heck happen to you?" He asked, stretching to the side to try to see into the hallway in search of a snickering Furey, Breta, or Falmen. There was no one there, and Fullmetal looked uncannily (albeit gleefully), serious.

"Turns out that trans dimensional portal you sent me to investigate was the real deal," When Mustang opened his mouth to question Ed's rapidly diminishing sanity, Edward cut him off, "and before you start blabbing to headquarters i'll have you know I hacked it so it won't open unless I want it to open." He folded his arms, looking quite proud of himself. "Long story short I ended up in the water near some kingdom called Alabasta and was picked up by a certain pirate crew which was. . . unusual to say the least. We joined forces, foiled an evil conspiracy, stopped a rebellion, and spent the rest of the weekend chillin' at the royal palace. Afterwards the captain, he wants to be the Pirate King by the way, asked me to join the crew and, you know what? I decided to go for it."

Mustang looked at Edward carefully. He didn't seem to be drunk. "Let me get this straight," he said. "You entered a magical portal-"

"a trans-dimensional portal "

"-onto another planet where you stopped a rebellion-"

"And a conspiracy, they called it Baroque something"

"—and decided to become pirate king—"

"No, crew member to the guy who wants to become pirate king."

Edward still looked very serious and very sober. And for the first time Mustang began to mentally calculate the probability of this actually happening. "Why?" he managed to choke out after a solid minuet.

Ed shrugged. "I guess I was tired of chasing my tail. Here in Admistris it was always dead end after dead end. I thought it was the worst thing in the world when I woke up on another planet with no Idea how to get back. But to be with those guys, to see them laughing and smiling every day,They weren't fighting to fix there mistakes, they were fighting for their dreams, and enjoying every minute of it.. . .and then I saw a country!" He exclaimed waving his hands. "An entire country fall astray to conspiracy and rebellion before we barely managed to fix it. You know what I saw there?" he asked "I saw Admistris. Both you and I know this country has gone to the dogs, no pun intended." His voice lowered. "Both you and I also know that there's something pretty corrupt going on with the higher ups, and quite frankly i'm not doing any good hiding in the ranks trying to find out what's going on."

Edward suddenly grinned like a maniac. "Also, I think i'm well suited for a life of piracy."

Ok, now that Mustang could believe. "You're missing the point Fullmetal," he said, barely believing that he was going along with this logic. "You joined the military for the sole purpose of restoring you and your brother's bodies. Now I don't know how much this 'new world' knows about alchemy-"

"Absolutely nothing at all," Edward said almost proudly.

"But the Admistris government is your fastest chance at solving the problem that you have. You can't afford to quit now."

Edward paused, then gave a small genuine smile.."You know, I've actually given this a lot of thought," he smirked "Being half made of metal actually has its advantages, I'm a lot stronger, I have a partial defense against all sword or bullet attacks, I have this useful little panel in my arm where I can store important stuff like keys, or train tickets, . . . "

Mustang suddenly realized why Edwards reports always came in crinkled and oil stained.

". . . and with the northern carbon steel auto mail I'm light enough to swim, which, let me tell you, is going to be useful where I'm going. I'm just so used to it by now that even if by some miracle I managed to get my real limbs back I know some bandit will attack me with a sword and I'll forget and try to grab it and I'll be back where I started."

"But, but your brother" whimpered Mustang almost hysterically. "If you want to help your brother you need this job for the library and the funding and-"

Edward interrupted with a flick of his hand. "Already taken care of," he beamed.

"WHAT!?"

"Well I mean, sure it's not the solution we had originally hoped for, and later on you know I'm going to analyze the science of it all like crazy," he laughed. "But I really think it works out better this way. I mean, sure he will never be able to swim, and he still abnormally tall most of the time, but apparently suits of armor can eat fruit."

**You can decide for yourself which DF fruit Alphonse ate. I was thinking maybe a Zoan. A cool one like a dragon or something so he could be a metallic dragon. But then thought of a morphing one. So he could turn into any human, his old self included, and be able to eat and feel the sunlight but if someone attacked he could go armor.**

**And truly, I think Edward would do more good, and be happier as a Straw hat pirate than a state alchemist pawn.**

**Thanks to my sister Reminiscence Awry for betaing, I bribed her with peanut butter M&amp;M's.**

**~Icetalon**


End file.
